How to Design a Book Cover Backwards
Essay
2019
On the somewhat fraught design process for Paradise Rot (published by Verso Books), including reminiscing, rationalization, and lots of killed covers—good and bad and ugly.
Read the full story and see the covers at Literary Hub. Excerpt below.
¶ I realized liquid could be read as blood, as urine, as saliva, as tears—all bodily, all relevant. It would be enigmatic, but not in the annoying way. I set the title in Helvetica, placing the cover squarely in the sixties, alongside a few of the references. I made it ooze. The result was weird, unlike anything I had done before. It excited me.